spatch

Oct. 23rd, 2009

Soupy Sales is dead. In case you don't know who Soupy was, he was the dignified, sophisticated children's show host as seen below:

I don't have time for a proper writeup on the man right now, but I do know that when reached for comment, a disconsolate White Fang said "Reh reh. Reh reh reah. Reh reah reh-reh reaaaaah."

So instead of the story of the time Soupy got away with socking Frank Sinatra in the face with a pie, please feel free to do The Mouse all you want with Soupy Sales.

Hey! Do the Mouse, yeah!
Hey! You can do it in your house, yeah!
On the rug or on the wall
If your folks get bugged, do it in the hall
Do the Mouse, yeah!
Let's do the Mouse, c'mon and do the Mouse with me!

One of the best and corniest jokes they did on the late 70s version of
the Soupy Sales ahow involved Dick Van Patten. If memory serves, it
was a cold opening and the sketch involved variants on the old
"Waiter, there's a fly in my soup!" gag.

Van Patten played the customer and Soupy played the waiter. They went
through the joke a few times, each time with Van Patten setting up the
joke in a different emotional state, as shown on a title card: #1 -
Scared. #2 - Enraged. #3 - Nervous, etc. Soupy would give a different
punchline every time. Finally, though, Van Patten got fed up with the
routine and refused to perform joke #9.

"Why don't you want to do the ninth joke?" Soupy asked.

And of course, Dick Van Patten replied "...because eight is enough!"

If that punchline had been used on any other comedy show (and it
probably was, to the point of overkill) it wouldn't have worked. But
on Soupy's show, and especially after a setup which was entertaining
in its own right, it was great.